As the mortgage industry continues to grapple with ever-changing regulations, training and education has become even more of a vital component when choosing which wholesaler to use – and surprisingly few manage to get top marks for this.

In our first ever Originators on Lenders survey, where more than 1,180 of you responded, about 73% of you felt that lenders’ commitment to training and education was important. Nonetheless, this is an area where lenders can do some work.

Of all the categories we asked you to rate, ranging from products to turnaround time to technology, training and education is one in which lenders scored the lowest. Their overall score was 7.37 out of 10, and only seven lenders received five-star ratings for their training and education.

This is where you felt many lenders weren’t quite making the grade. On average, lenders received their lowest scores in training and education – and only a handful received five-star ratings in that category.
In many cases, training and education was simply “not there,” as one originator complained.

“It’s up to me and me only,” another said. In other cases, respondents complained of desultory, by-the-numbers training that either wasn’t engaging or wasn’t relevant enough to be worth the time.
“Webinars,” one originator said. “Not my favorite format.”

Non-traditional wholesaler Angel Oak Mortgage Solutions said educating customers is a top priority at the Atlanta-based company. “Because of our commitment and the fact that we do a lot of non-agency loans, it’s critical for our sales force to train our customers,” said Tom Hutchens, senior vice president of sales and marketing at Angel Oak. “We are doing some challenging loans and our goal is to help brokers maneuver through the process.”